Jude Law manages to look the part of Putin. Dano plays his role in a preternaturally calm fashion (too little range for me to see his character as real). Alicia Vikamder blends into the role as the wife of a powerbroker. Her touch was a bit softer than Carmella Soprano.

I enjoyed it because it covers a profoundly interesting time between the fall of the Soviet Union and the 2010s. It has a lower than average Rotten Tomato score perhaps because it doesn't completely fit some of the common tropes about media.

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Posted by SlowFlowPro

With populists, expect populism

Member since Jan 2004

477368 posts

Posted on 5/18/26 at 10:33 am to molsusports

quote:
It has a lower than average Rotten Tomato score perhaps because it doesn't completely fit some of the common tropes about media.

What do you mean, specifically?

Because it seems to paint Putin/Russia in a poor light and that's a leftist cause du jour.

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Posted by molsusports

Member since Jul 2004

37539 posts

Posted on 5/18/26 at 12:24 pm to SlowFlowPro

There are discussions about their use of cultural media that probably satisfy neither side of the American cultural divide.

The movie missed the opportunity to delve into Yeltsin's motivation for choosing Putin as a successor (Boris was afraid of punishment for his own corruption when he left power) and also didn't touch directly on Putin's massive accumulation of personal wealth. But what it does cover I thought was relatively accurate.

I also like the actors involved even if Dano didn't show much range. The American presidents are never really directly invoked when Putin or Yeltin are featured. That's probably a miss when the Bill and Boris drink together or Bush gazes into Putin"s eyes (and badly misjudges his character) were there for the taking

This post was edited on 5/18/26 at 12:26 pm

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